Connection

The other day I was asked

If I was connected to “my people.”

A long time ago, when I was six years old

I attended a pow wow and was pushed to the earth because I was white.

White boys weren’t allowed to dance, I was told.

 

Then, at the age of 11, I was in fight at a middle school track meet for yet another reason.

Injuns can’t compete with Texans, I was told.

By this time, I had turned Indian.

So I spoke up with an American fist and the Texan boy listened.

 

However, to this day, I do not fight with fists.

I fight with a dance – a dance between two worlds,

One dark and one light,

One half Native American, the other half white.

 

When I am asked, are you connected to your “people?”

I will answer, no.

 

I am connected to not a people, a creed, or a race.

Instead, I am connected to the ground and to the earth.

I am connected to the sound of wind moving across the desert dirt.

I am connected to the fire of the sun, the weight of the moon,

and to the arms of my mother and father at birth.

I am connected to the electrical spirit of the land –

The spirit that gave me life, the spirit that fuels my soul,

and the spirit that never asks for anything in return.

Forever beyond flesh and bone,

I am connected to the waves of physics, the laws of nature, the energy of sound

and I am bound to the farthest corners of the universe

secured forever to the smallest blades of grass in the ground.